Censorship – The Arts

The upcoming film Dhadak 2 by filmmaker Karan Johar has finally cleared the CBFC wall, but not without taking a few hits. The Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) approved the film with a U/A 16+ certificate, but demanded several changes in dialogues, visuals, and disclaimers.

Starring Siddhant Chaturvedi and Triptii Dimri, the film explores caste discrimination through a hard-hitting narrative. However, the CBFC trimmed the impact by tweaking or muting multiple lines and scenes.
A Bollywood Hungama report reveals that the original line, “3,000 years of backlog will not be cleared in just 70 years,” was changed to a less direct version: “The backlog of age-old discrimination will not be cleared in just 70 years.”

CBFC also targeted another powerful line: “Nilesh, yeh kalam dekh rahe ho… Raaj kar rahe hain.” It now reads: “Yeh chota sa dhakkan puri kalam ka thoda sa hissa hai aur baki ke hai hum; phir bhi hamare sar par baithe hua hai kyon.”

The censors muted caste slurs like ‘chamar’ and ‘bhangi’, replacing them with the word ‘junglee’. They also softened a religious dialogue from “Dharam ka kaam hai” to “Punya ka kaam hai.”

One intense monologue about upper-caste oppression was entirely rewritten. The original spoke about Savarna roads burning Dalits. The revised line says, “Na sadke humari thi, na zameen humari thi, na paani humara tha; yahaan tak ki zindagi bhi humari nahi thi; marne ki naubat aayi to shaher aa gaya.”

The CBFC also axed the recitation of the poem Thakur Ka Kuan and removed a doha by Saint Tulsidas from a song.

Visuals didn’t go untouched either. A five-second scene of someone urinating on Siddhant’s character was deleted. The board also removed a shot of a blue-painted dog and trimmed a scene where Nilesh’s father faces public humiliation.

Even the disclaimer got stretched. From a short 20 seconds, it now runs for 1 minute and 51 seconds. The CBFC wants it read aloud during the film.